One of my favorite reads lately is at 24 Fighting Chickens. It's a Shotokan site, but most of the stuff there can be generalized to any form of martial arts. I can't say I agree with everything written there (or even with half of it) but it's all well reasoned and well argued stuff. They have a very nice set of podcasts as well.

The reason I bring this up is that the current front page article is about the relationship between kata and kumite. I happen to have been thinking about this a little bit myself and came to much the opposite conclusion of the Fighting Chicken authors.

I'll paraphrase their argument first. It basically says that kata do not have much of anything to do with one's fighting prowess, or more specifically to one's sparring prowess. As evidence they point to competitive karate and the fact that kumite champions are rarely, if ever, kata champions, and that kata champions do not often evolve into great sparrers (if that's even a word).

I can see the point they're trying to make but I have to disagree with it for a couple of reasons.

First, all their argument proves is that the traits that make a champion kata performer are not the same as those make for a good fighter. That is, the people predisposed to do one well don't necessarily do the other well. Think of someone like me - I have poor reaction time. I could never be a great fighter - NEVER - in the sense of being able to win competitions against others of comparable experience. The best I could ever hope for is to be better than people who are less experienced or less well trained than I am - which is, in fact, all I hope for. No matter how I trained I could never win fighting competitions. On the other hand, while my kata are nothing great, I could imagine working really hard at them and one day do well (or at least adequately) in a kata competition. My lack of good reaction time will simply not matter during a kata competition.

The real question is whether a kata champion is better at fighting than they would have been had they never trained kata, and the answer is, I believe, yes. I'll tell you why.

Before my Shodan promotion in June of this year I was practicing my kata a lot. During that promotion I had to spar quite a bit. A guy from another dojo told me I was moving well, which shocked me - I'm not good at moving around, generally speaking. In retrospect, he was right - I was moving around as well or better than I ever had before (though still not nearly as well as someone who is actually good at this). For example, after/ while blocking kicks I like to close with my opponent and try to land a few punches before they can regain their balance. I was doing this well during the promotion, though again, I mean well FOR ME, not compared to anybody else.

I was sparring in class the other week and felt that I was not moving very well. However, I'm stronger and in better shape than I was back in June. What changed? I think it might be the fact that I haven't been practicing kata.

How is this possible? I'm glad you asked. It seems improbable, after all. If you watched one of our kata we almost never assume the positions and stances that we use while sparring. How could kata have improved my movement?

I think that moving your body around in weird or awkward ways (such as are found in may kata, with 270 degree turns and whatnot) teaches you a fundamental kind of coordination and make you better at moving your body in general. I can't pull out any studies to prove this, but I myself am a lot more graceful than I was before starting karate practice - I'm better at doing anything physical than I used to be (I used to be really uncoordinated, now I'm just below average). So spinning and turning and moving in deep, awkward stances has made me better at shuffling, sidestepping, and dodging in a less awkward fighting stance.

This is also an argument in favor of the deep, awkward stances you see in karate practice. Why practice moving in a deep front or horse stance? Because if you get strong enough and agile enough to be mobile in a deep front stance you'll be much quicker moving around in a shallow fighting stance. You're using leverage and position to make the movements harder to develop your own core ability to move around. Think of it as comparable to running around in a weight vest - you get stronger, and when you take it off you'll be faster at moving without the vest.

Should we then fight in a deep, awkward stance, then resume our normal shallow stance for tournaments or promotions? I think that if we did we'd miss out on the timing and coordination you get from fighting. You'd be unfamiliar with moving in a fighting stance. But practicing kata, or walking practice, in a deep stance will get you good at keeping level, coordinating your hip movement, and driving off the floor, and with a little fighting practice you should be able to transfer that to sparring.

I am not saying that kata alone will make you a great fighter. Some will argue that, but not me. I do think that getting good at kata will make you better at fighting, but you need to practice kumite as well.

Osu.